Just Outside The Door
by Ahsirk
Summary: Sometimes we miss what's in front of us, sometimes we just don't push hard enough and sometimes we're just right outside the door.


**Just Outside The Door**

Disclaimer: Let's keep it simple. No.

**Brought to you by procrastination. This takes places just a bit after Nao and Mikoto's first encounter in the anime. **

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_Don't get too close because I don't want to have to owe you anything. I don't want to have to show my back to you and feel the cold steel pierce me once again. _

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The girl was trouble. Aoi knew this for a fact since she happened to be the fiery redhead's roommate. Yuuki Nao was a cute girl. There was no doubt about it. However, looking cute and being cute were two very different things. Takumi-kun was cute. Akira-kun was cute. Nao was anything but cute.

Aoi quickly learned her younger roommate was more than she seemed. Sneaking out late, spending entire nights out, and coming back to the dorms at odd hours of the day clued her in on what the redhead might possibly be doing, but Aoi knew it wasn't her place to ask, wasn't her place to judge. Aoi resolved not to butt into her roommate's life despite her rather nosy nature. She had a feeling pushing would yield the opposite effect. She would keep at a distance, but only to stay close by rather than out of reach.

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Quietly shutting the door behind her, Nao slumped back against the wall, letting out a heavy sigh. She frowned at the memory of the past half hour. The cuts on her face stung at the recollection. The girl just had to go for the face, but thank god for the existence of naive saps. Minagi was one of the most gullible people she had ever met. Such raw power, Nao had been easily overwhelmed by the kid's strength, but thankfully there wasn't much going on up there in that head of hers.

A wicked smile touched her lips. Too easy. Minagi was just too easy to trick. She could have a lot of fun with her, but for the moment the girl would serve as a useful tool on her nightly ventures. It wasn't her fault Minagi was easy to manipulate. No one was going to watch your back unless they were waiting for you to turn around before twisting a bent and bloody knife into you. You have to watch your own back if you want to survive.

Besides, it would be better if she didn't find her missing brother. He probably just abandoned her and Minagi was merely clinging to a memory, a lie.

Family wasn't worth shit. In the end, they don't care about you. When they get tired of you, they just cart you around from one house to the next. In the end, all of them were relieved when that problem child was shipped off to boarding school on a scholarship they didn't have to pay for.

I didn't need their damned pity or their egotistical charity. I didn't need them or their fake smiles and false words of everything was going to be alright. Like hell it was going to be alright. My mother was in a fucking coma. My father, my brother, my sister, they were all dead and six feet under. And those bastards, those fucking bastards were still alive after what they did. I can still see it, smell it. My home painted in steaks of dark red. The blood, so much blood all over the carpet where I used to wrestle with my younger brother. All over the furniture where we used to eat together, laughing and talking. All over the walls were my parents, full of pride, used to hang our pictures from grade school, no matter how embarrassing or poorly drawn they were. It was not going to be alright.

"Nao, is that you?" Aoi whispered in the dark before flipping on the lights, snapping Nao out of her thoughts. Regaining her composure and relaxing the fists she hadn't realized she'd made, the redhead threw the older girl an amused look upon seeing the baseball bat in her roommate's hands. The brunette smiled sheepishly and weakly attempted to hide the object behind her. The smile instantly turned into a frown as she saw the numerous cuts on the younger girl's face. She went back into her room to fetch a first aid kit.

"I don't need your help, woman!" Nao didn't find the need to keep up the good girl act with Aoi. The older girl already knew her roommate had quite the unsavory attitude.

Aoi fixed her with a lethal stare that made the redhead inwardly squirm and reluctantly take a seat.

Sometimes it's okay to let people help you as long as you don't have to do anything in return. Besides, more often than not they're doing it for their own benefit. I'll use your good will as I pleas--.

"Shit that hurt," Nao cursed, pulling back from the helping hand as well as her malicious thoughts.

"Don't be such a wuss," the brunette half heartedly mocked, putting a band aid across a particularly nasty cut. "You know," she added after a moment of silence, "You look cute, but you don't act cute." To the older girl's surprise a blush began to form on her roommate's face before it turned red from anger rather than embarrassment.

"Sorry for not living up to your expectations," she shot back, sarcasm dripping with every word. Nao definitely looked cute alright, but a storm was raging in those narrowed, lime green eyes. Aoi brushed it off due to fortified defenses from having lived with that demon of a little sister back home, who happened to be a far more formidable opponent.

"You should take better care of your face," Aoi fussed over the remaining injuries. "Please have some consideration for what I have to look at everyday."

Nao scoffed. She didn't understand. She didn't let it show on her face, but that didn't mean she understood. Aoi didn't ask. She never once said a word about her comings and goings. Well she did, but not the ones you'd expect.

After Aoi finished playing medic, she looked her roommate dead in the eye. "You better be on time for class tomorrow. Takano-sensei's been on my back all day about it."

With that, the brunette sauntered on back into bed, leaving behind a scowling Nao. With a statement like that, Nao didn't have to acknowledge Aoi's kindness, didn't have to see her as someone she could lean on. The statement provided the older girl with an excuse to be right outside the door rather than stepping inside where she wasn't welcome, but Nao didn't know that. Nao didn't know she already had a friend watching her back.

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**Feel free to review and tell me what you think. ^_^**


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